January 13

I met a girl last night. "Don't Stop Believing" was playing over the sound system and people were dancing, drinking, and having a good time. Our eyes met from across the room and she quickly looked away. I didn't think anything of it until our eyes met again; this time staying locked upon each other for a split second longer. As she broke our connection, I noticed the corner of her mouth rise just a bit to form a smile. She turned to face her friends and I downed the rest of my beer before chucking the bottle aside.

After apologizing to the guy I had hit, I made my way across the dance floor. I reached out as if reaching through a cloud of fog. I had my blinders on and the room moved in slow motion. All I could see was her beautiful, blond hair and everything else was a blur.

My outstretched fingers grazed her left shoulder. She turned, and like a dream, a gust of wind picked up her golden locks and pushed them off of her face. She looked at me and I at her. I made a quirky remark and had her hooked from the first line.

We talked all night as Bon Jovi, Michael Jackson remixes, and more Journey filled the smokey air. As time passed and the crowd dissipated, the bouncers took out their flashlights and forced people into the cold night air, but I couldn't let the moment pass. I couldn't let this one get away like all of the countless others. I asked to borrow her phone and entered my number before pressing send. I now had her number and she had mine. I wasn't going to screw this up. She was the prettiest girl I had ever seen and I was going to play this one right. This was the first number I had ever received and I knew the rules: No calling for three days.

In the parking lot, we said our goodbyes. No hugs or kisses were issued because I knew I had to keep her wanting more. As she drove off, I noticed one of her tail lights was out. Something had to be done! Someone had to tell her! I reached for my phone, found her number, started a new text, but then remembered my promise to myself. I would not try and contact her at all for three days. Besides, what would she do about a tail light at 2:17 in the morning?

* * * *

Tomorrow would have been the third day. I was so close. Every minute that passed, made my heart beat a tad faster. She's the one; I just knew it. I could still see her smiling from across the dance floor. I could remember every detail, small or large, about her. I would have given anything to wake up every day for the rest of my life and look into those beautiful brown eyes. Or were they green? No, they were definitely blue. How could I forget those glacier-like blue eyes?

Today, after I got off work, the sun was still out. There wasn't a cloud in the sky and it was beautiful. A walk around the local lake would have been the perfect first date. It wouldn't cost anything and it would have been the perfect time to continue with our discussion of whether or not we thought Simon was really going to leave American Idol. I knew she didn't have to work her shift today at Starbucks (location undetermined) so she had to be available, right?

I wanted to call right then and not wait for the completion of the third day. Why was that such a magic number anyway? We got along great the other night! So what if a lot of alcohol was involved? I felt something and I knew not waiting for three days wouldn't ruin that. Two days was better than calling her after just one. She was probably wondering if I would ever call. If the past thirty-seven hours felt long to me, they must have felt like an eternity for her. I was going to call her.

My heartbeat quickened and my breath became a series of short inhales and exhales as my shaking hand reached for my belt. I could barely unfasten the clip that held my phone to my waste. After stumbling through my contact list, I came upon my newest addition.

A part of me kept insisting that I shouldn't call her. "It hasn't been three days! That rule had to be there for a reason. People don't just make things up and have them stick."

Another part of me was fighting off the first voice. "She wants you, but she's not going to wait forever."

"Don't do it," responded the first voice. "Rules are rules and breaking them will cause horrible things to happen. Do you want to permanently lose her?"

As I sat and listened to these two voices of reason battle it out, I stared blankly at my phone's screen. God, she was beautiful; the closest thing to perfection I had ever encountered. With that, I had made my decision. The three day thing was just a silly superstition that people who couldn't get girls made up. I was going to do it. I was going to call my future wife and ask her to meet me at the park. Send.

It began instantly. A breeze as sudden as lightning rustled the leaves in the nearest tree. Soon it became a strong wind that whipped the branches of all the trees back and forth. In my shock, I dropped my phone. My heart stopped as I watched the phone slowly descend. Please don't let the battery fly out causing me to lose my call, I thought. Luckily the phone hit the top of my loafer but slid on its back down the rough sidewalk's surface towards a crack I swore wasn't there moments before.

People were running for cover as clothing and papers were thrashed around like flags in a hurricane. I could still hear the beautiful sound of the phone trying to make a connection as it slid away from me and stopped just short of a few inches from the crack in the sidewalk. In the chaos of trash being thrown around and people scurrying, I noticed the crack was growing. It crawled in both directions to split the sidewalk. I dove for my phone, but in my haste, I accidentally knocked it closer to the expanding crack that had now reached a staggering four feet in length.

It wasn't just growing in length, though. It had actually begun to cave in on itself as it continued to grow. At the last minute, I was able to reach out and grab my phone before it fell into the endless and cavernous void.

As I held on to the device, people were still running, screaming, and panicking as pandemonium spread. In the time that it took for me to save my phone, the blue sky had been replaced by ominous and dark clouds. Flashes of light, interspersed with loud and booming thunder, shot across the sky as the ground shook and the hole in the ground kept growing in pursuit of escapees.

I lifted the phone to my ear just in time to hear someone answer. It was her! I parted my lips to yell over the screams of people and thunder in the clouds. Before I got the chance, someone ran into me causing me to fling my phone towards the gaping mouth in the earth.

I watched in horror as my phone flew through the air towards the hungry abyss. There wasn't anything I could do. I yelled as loud as I could, "I love you!" but it was too late. The phone flew over the edge and down into the nothingness that waited below.

The ground continued to shake and groan, but the crack had ceased in its growth. Was it just my imagination, or was the hole actually closing in and filling itself? How could this be possible? Just as I squinted and tried to make out what was happening, the wind kicked up even more; stirring dust, trash, leaves, dirt and anything else it could grab. The air became so opaque with obstruction that I had to hold my arm over my face and pray for the best.

After what seemed like a lifetime, the wind stopped as suddenly as it had started and I felt the warmth of the sun again on the back of my neck. Slowly, I brought my arm away from my face and expected to see what Hiroshima must have looked like after Enola Gay had dropped Little Boy. To my surprise, everything had returned to exactly the way it was two minutes before. The air was still and the clouds were gone.

I looked around and expected to see the same confusion that I felt written on the face of the people that I had seen running for cover just moments before. There wasn't one sign of what had just happened. Everyone was carrying on as if it was all a dream. No one had ripped or torn clothing and the grass wasn't covered in strewn garbage. Not even the sidewalk showed any sign of ever being split. The only evidence that anything had happened was the absence of my cell phone.

Let this be a lesson to all of you. If you ever get a phone number from a girl at a bar or anywhere else for that matter, don't let my mistake happen to you. Rules are made for a reason. Don't ever, under any circumstance, call her until the third day.